I'll Keep You Safe
by nuttyjigs
Summary: There are some people you'd be willing to take a bullet for. [Post-manga ending]


"Hey…Hey. Watch-!"

Yut-lung had never heard a gunshot so loud.

It chased all the other sounds away so the only thing left after it had sliced through the air was the blank, deaf ring of silence and the screams of civilians so far away they sounded as if they had been conjured by his mind as an obligatory complement to the instant chaos unfolding around them. People running everywhere, and there was a rush, and there was a weight in Yut-lung's arms and in the distance he saw some of his men break into a pursuit.

"Call an ambulance." He felt the command drop from his mouth with automatic clarity, and saw his nearest retainer whip out a phone. But the world around him was blurred, his senses dampened but for the vague awareness of a warmth seeping between his fingertips.

"Shit. _Shit._ "

The words brushed against Yut-lung's cheek in hissed breaths; the scene slowly came into focus. The fabric of his sleeve pulling, clutched tight against Sing's fist, Sing's eyes darting around at the panic, then resting on him, Sing's weight slowly dragging them both to the ground. Sing bleeding into the sidewalk.

"D'they getcha?" he slurred, and suddenly Yut-lung felt a surge of anger.

"What kind of a question is that?" he snapped. He squeezed his eyes shut. "You…You got shot. They shot you."

"Shit. Thanks f'the news."

That Sing could be sarcastic at a time like this would have normally shot Yut-lung's nerves with annoyance, but his insides were going cold just as his arms were being drenched in seeping warmth. His head was spinning. Why was that? He'd seen so much death in his short, miserable life. Why now?

Death. That's not what this was going to be, right?

Red was pooling on the sunny concrete. Red was seeping into the denim of Sing's jacket. His face was scrunched in a grimace. In the daylight, he looked pale. His grip on Yut-lung's sleeve was going slack.

Yut-lung thought of his mother, a beautiful, limp doll lying in a spreading puddle of her own blood.

Dead.

Something inside Yut-lung was unravelling, spilling out. He hated the sudden dizziness, the unexplainable nausea. Why was he remembering this now? Of course. The world had taken his mother away from him. It would take Sing away, too, just like her, bleeding out into the ground.

But that had been Yut-lung's mother. This was just another stupid kid on the street, just another wannabe gangster, just…

"Sing." Yut-lung snapped. He heard his voice waver. He slapped himself mentally. " _Sing_."

"Huh?" It was hardly more than a wheeze. Sing's eyes fluttered a fraction open; closed. His voice had been high, cracked. Delirious? Breathy? Weak?

Yut-lung squeezed Sing's drenched sleeve, pressing against what must have been the wound. Was that hurting him? Did he feel it at all? His body was heavy and unmoving in Yut-lung's arms. "An ambulance is on the way. I need you to stay with me." What for? Staying awake wouldn't stop the bleeding or take the bullet back. Yut-lung knew it was nothing more than a bullshit line spouted in dramatic movies. But he didn't like watching Sing lose consciousness, slip into an imitation of death. It made him uncomfortable. Dizzy. Scared?

What for?

It scared him. It scared Yut-lung that Sing had been laughing over something stupid just a moment ago and was now painting the sidewalk red with his blood. It scared him that liquid life was dripping over his fingers, scalding them. It scared him when he realized that Sing had blocked a bullet meant for him with his own body.

Why would he do that? What for?

Somewhere behind him, Yut-lung heard more gunshots, muffled, far-away. People were talking. Someone was crying, his sobs growing louder and more hysterical, turning into some disgusting, anguished outpour sloppily held back by deep breaths taken and held, if only to stop that gross, pitiful noise. If only to shut it up. If only to hide it away.

He held Sing closer and dipped his head so his hair shielded his face like a curtain, and no one would see the tears drip from his face.

"Hey…Isn't it kinda awkward?"

"A little. I've never really bought food on the streets before. And _don't_ laugh at me for that."

"What? No, I mean your guys just following us around."

"They're scattered, standing back, wearing civilian clothes, and blending in, just like I ordered them to. Isn't that what you asked for?"

"Yeah, but…I dunno. Maybe it's cool with you, but it's kinda weird for me. Y'know like they're, I dunno, snoopy friends or overprotective parents or something."

"You'll just have to get used to it. Even if we're not doing anything dangerous, it's better to be safe."

"Think you'll get shot buying a beer off a convenience store?"

"I'm sorry you're not the head of a multi-billion-dollar family conglomerate with dangerous, likely fatal ties to the underworld and can't relate."

"Wow, damn, you didn't have to go so hard. Why are you like this?"

"Again. Not my idea to waste a day walking around the city doing nothing. So don't blame me for being a bit cranky about it."

"Know what? Let's go find that convenience store. I think you could use a drink."

In the ambulance, the sirens drowned out everything else. Yut-lung could just barely remember Sing('s body) being pried away from him, his stepping (stumbling) through the ambulance doors, a heavy blanket around his shoulders, some vague words of comfort.

That idiot. He'd pushed him out of the way. The bullet was meant for Yut-lung, but Sing had pushed him out of the way.

He stared down at his hands, soaked in red. Shaking.

He crossed his arms tight to make them stop, and the red smeared on the white of his shirt.

"I wonder what Eiji Okumura must have meant to him."

"What are you talking about? If you didn't know, you wouldn't have kept trying to fuckin' kill him."

"Don't look at me like that. I…I regret that. I'm sure you know."

"I-I'm sorry; I just…I don't wanna talk about it. Not now."

"I…Maybe I just wish I could know how it feels. To be so devoted to a person. To be able to die smiling like that."

"It's not something you can explain. It's something you have to feel for yourself to understand."

"And I suppose it's not meant for me."

"Don't say that. Hey, you're moving forward, and that's more than a lot of the trash in this crap city can say."

"…Thank you. You're right. Let's forget about it. 'Just for today,' right?"

Sing woke up to that disgustingly sterile hospital smell, followed by the distant, muddled feeling of getting punched hard by a huge guy wearing spiked gloves. Or, you know, getting shot.

He forced out a shaky breath, reached out for his shoulder. His arm was held in a sling, and he was dressed in one of those lame hospital gowns that opened down the back. He could just barely feel it through what must have been painkillers or something, like he'd been stabbed along his entire arm by a metal pole or…or something.

Like getting shot.

Fuck. He got _shot_.

He was still struggling to remember what exactly had happened when he looked up and met Yut-lung's widened eyes. It was just for a split second, but Sing could've sworn he saw a flash of worry, then the slightest exhale of…relief?

He blinked slowly through his drugged stupor, and when he looked again, Yut-lung wore his usual expression of mild annoyance and frustration towards anything that moved.

 _Then_ he remembered.

"Shit. You were right," Sing laughed, but it felt like choking on sandpaper. "I can't believe…someone almost fucking _shot_ you…just for leaving the house _once_ …No kidding."

"Why are you laughing? Is this just a _joke_ to you?"

Sing stopped laughing, and he saw that Yut-lung wasn't just mildly annoyed. He was _livid_.

"I'll tell _you_ who got _shot_. _You_ got shot. Because you were stupid enough to purposely stand in front of a _bullet_." The words shot out of Yut-lung, a stream of fire shooting from the maw of a dragon. "And the doctors thought you might bleed out; they thought you could _die_ , and you wake up after _hours_ of surgery, and then you laugh about it. You _laugh_."

"Well _gee_. I'm sorry I saved your life."

"You _better_ be." Yut-lung drew a sharp breath. Uncrossed his arms, finger-combed his hair for half a second before rubbing down his face. Crossed his arms. Uncrossed them. Sing wondered if he'd been drinking, because usually he was like this when he was drunk. But the room was totally empty and smelled only of hospital.

Sing looked away for a moment; Yut-lung's fidgeting was making him feel uneasy by transmission. "Hey…I can't have you just _asking_ people to shoot you. Again."

"So why did you insist on leaving the house on foot without close guard? Why did _you_ go get shot?"

"You talk like I just walked up to 'em, took the gun, and shot _myself_." Yut-lung was pissing Sing off again in that trademark way only he could pull off. "Damn. I thought it would be _fun_. Just go live one, _one_ normal day and try to forget all the crazy shit that's gone down. _One_ day. Okay? Geez. I thought it would be _nice_."

"It…It was."

Sing turned back to Yut-lung so fast he felt the torn muscles in his arm strain at the motion. " _What?_ "

"It was nice. While it lasted."

Yut-lung was still now, sitting stiff with his hands in his lap, turned just perfectly so his hair (gone undone) completely covered his face. (Had he been wearing that shirt awhile ago? Wait, what _time_ was it?)

Suddenly Sing was at a loss. "Um…Yeah. It was."

"But we're never doing that again. I don't like you getting shot."

"R…Right."

"So I had my men procure a bulletproof vest for you."

"Huh?"

"It won't stop you from getting hurt, but it's better than this." When Yut-lung faced him again, his face was set in that blank determination mob bosses tended to wear, but there was something…softer about him. Something so barely perceptible Sing could almost blame it on the painkillers. "When you're feeling up to it, I also intend for you to pick out a personal firearm."

Sing's brows knotted together. _Now_ he felt like he was hallucinating. "What are you talking about?"

"I just told you. I don't want you getting shot at. So I'm hiring you as my personal bodyguard."

"You don't want me to get shot…So you want me to be a bodyguard."

"Would you prefer it if I told you never to come near me again?" Yut-lung snapped, but his words shook just a little. "Because…because that might be better."

Sing thought about it, but something about it felt so improbable that the very idea of it just slipped out of his mind immediately. It occurred to him how often he was at Yut-Lung's these days, ever since the day he almost shot him. "Take back Chinatown", right?

But it was a little more than that. Something that couldn't be explained. Something felt.

"Nah...You got me there. I'll take the job." He held out his uninjured hand and put on his cheekiest grin. "Nice doing business with you. _Sir_."

"Don't call me that!" Yut-Lung flushed. Sing thought he'd never seen him this out of it, even when drunk, and he intended to make the best of it.

"Oh right. It's 'young master', right? Or 'lord'? 'Your highness'?"

Yut-Lung looked just about ready to clock Sing across the face, but hitting a hospitalized gunshot patient was a little cruel even for him. Oh, and last time he tried that, he'd ended up on his ass on the ground. "It's just Yut-Lung."

"Blanca called you 'sir.'" Sing huffed, taking his hand back. "What's it gonna look like if I stick by your side all the time casually tossing your first name around, but you go, nah, man, he's just my bodyguard."

"W-What are you trying to say?"

Yut-Lung's blushing must have been contagious because the look on his face made Sing feel heat rise up to his face as well. He coughed, raising his free arm above his eyes. "Ah. Fuck. Forget that. Forget I said that."

"I should call a nurse." And suddenly Yut-lung was up and out the door, still running his fingers through his hair.

Sing breathed out in the cold, sterile air, listening to the whirring of the machines and waiting for his heartbeat to settle. His entire arm was throbbing with the memory of the bullet. He remembered the suspicious man he'd seen over Yut-lung's shoulder, a hand hidden in his coat. And after that was a blank, then just the explosion of a thousand miles per hour stabbing into him. Before that, he couldn't remember what they'd been talking about, but he could remember the tension slowly melting off of Yut-lung's face through the day. Maybe into an almost-smile. Sing wasn't sure he'd ever seen Yut-lung genuinely smile. He wasn't sure Yut-lung had ever smiled in his life.

He wasn't sure why he was lying here after a near-death experience, wondering if Yut-lung had ever smiled.

And he thought of the way Ash had looked at Eiji, a special kind of look just for him.

He mumbled to himself, "God, Sing Soo-ling. You're such a fucking idiot. But you better live with that, 'cause it's a bit too late to take that agreement back."

So Sing just lay there with his free hand over his eyes, and his heartbeat wasn't slowing and the heat hadn't left his face, and he wondered if the nurse would record a fever off of him when she came back with Yut-lung in tow, probably still fussing with the tips of his hair. And he wondered if this was the right decision at all, if he should have just turned Yut-lung down, or let him get shot, or left him brooding in that huge, empty house, never knowing what it was like to just walk around the city without anywhere to go, next to someone who was apparently willing to take a bullet for you.

Sing wondered if he was willing to do it all over again, and the answer was yes.


End file.
